“Some of us are becoming the men we wanted to marry.”
Gloria Steinem
I’d like to talk to Gloria Steinem. I’d like to hear her life story, and hear about her childhood. I’d like to hear how she thinks we women have fared over the years. I’d like to discuss with her, my thoughts on being a woman, a woman who has so much of what Gloria was fighting for: the job, the children, the house, the independence.
Part of me, the bitter part, would thank her for liberating me from having to make a choice between full time worker or stay at home mom.
I might thank her for fighting to give me the freedom to do both, as many of the women I know are today.
The problem is that women who do it all, often watch their men kick back, turn it down a notch with every notch we kick up. We pick up more slack for the guy we’ve taken off the hook. We end up doing it all, and we become bitter for missing so much, because we miss a lot when we do it all. We are strong women, and we can do it all, but in the process, we’ve lost respect for the guy who saw this as an opportunity and took it, and unwittingly killed the relationship.
I’d like to ask Gloria if she thinks we’ve painted ourselves into a corner.
“I have yet to hear a man ask for advice on how to combine marriage and a career.”
Gloria Steinem
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The Daily Post
Jan 22, 2015
Daily Prompt
Fireside Chat
What person whom you don’t know very well in real life — it could be a blogger whose writing you enjoy, a friend you just recently made, etc. — would you like to have over for a long chat in which they tell you their life story?
<a href="http://Fireside Chat“>Fireside Chat
Lydia, I’m going to hear Gloria Steinem talk in a couple of weeks. She’s a guest speaker at the San Miguel Writer’s Conference. Looking forward to it. Have you read her books? Judy
That is amazing to still do appearances at 80! How fortunate you are to be there! I have only read the book of essays “Outrageous Acts”. She has done so much. I do have great respect for her. You’ll have to share her thoughts.
I enjoyed your post. You raise very valid points. Hardest thing in life is to achieve balance…You make this point in different words. Judy
Oops…I read just one of her books, long ago. It was an autobiography about her early life. Very interesting…
The thing is, has always been, we can’t do it all. We try, but something takes a hit. The marriage, the kid(s). Our sex life. Our friendships. Because there aren’t enough hours in the day or days in the week. The kids, my granddaughter’s generation, have no intention of even trying. They won’t do it all. They’ll do the career and wait on the marriage, who do a career and maybe a relationship, but hold the kids. I don’t know whether they are smarter from watching us, frightened by us, find us too hard an act to follow … or they are lazy and don’t want to work that hard. Or all of the above.
Well said Marilyn. I hope my children have a better handle on this. Its a nice idea, but flawed.
It would probably be reasonable and workable but for the lack of affordable child care and husbands willing to really pitch in.
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My daughter is a lawyer, her husband is a journalist, they both work their butts off and they have excellent childare. And… They are both overwhelmed, overtired and overstressed. They NEVER have time off, either singly or together. Their kids are almost 4 and just 2, and it breaks both parents’ hearts that they’re missing so much of those early years.
We can’t have it all, and pretending we can is setting up unfair and unrealistic expectations.